9. Leah
9
Leah
W e have had more customers in the shop this morning than all week long. All those samples are finally paying off. Maybe my signs are working. Maybe my Facebook ads are finally being seen. Or maybe it’s Sunday and people feel like going out for breakfast.
Arnold is back again, but he hasn’t ordered anything yet. He’s people-watching. He is taking up the one and only table in my quaint shop… Maybe he’s waiting for someone like Cooper to take pity on him again since I refuse to give the man one more sample. Come on, Arnold! Of all people, you know we can’t give out freebies forever.
Cricket stands at the register while I bring out another batch of rolls, filling up my front case.
“I’ll take a pecan roll,” the one man in line says to Cricket.
She tilts her head, her long, pinkish-blonde ponytail falling over one shoulder. “Could you choose something else?” Cricket says to the man as he studies our short menu.
He peers down from the overhead TV with our assortment of rolls listed. “Excuse me? ”
I’m confused too. I’m bringing out a dozen pecan rolls as he speaks. We haven’t run out. Cricket has eyes—she can see what’s in the case. They’re my best seller.
“I said,” Cricket replies. “Can you choose something other than the pecan bun?” The girl has the gall to smile at him.
The man’s eyes dart to me, maybe because I’m watching Cricket too.
“I’ve got more right here,” I tell her.
“Oh, I know.” She slides her gaze back to the man, waiting for an answer.
“Cricket—”
“You had a pecan roll yesterday,” she tells him. “Choose something else.”
“Um, no I didn’t.” The man’s cheeks have gone red.
This loon is going to lose me money. If she weren’t so good at what she does for a measly twelve dollars an hour, I’d fire her. But she’s kind of fantastic at creating an orange roll. My recipe and Cricket’s technique—it’s magical.
“Have you ever considered the orange rolls?” she says to the man. “They sit and watch as pecan roll after pecan roll sells. They’d like to be chosen too.” She tilts her head as if she’s given the next “I Have A Dream” speech.
“Ohhh-kay. Hey, Cricket,” I say, setting down my tray of rolls and patting her shoulder. “Andrea’s making more orange rolls in the back. Do you think you could help her?”
“Sure,” she says, her smile falsely bright. Her brows raise, and just before she steps through the kitchen door, she looks back at our customer. “Orange rolls!”
I wait for Cricket to leave before turning back to the man. “How many pecan rolls did you want?”
“Four,” he says.
“No problem.” I let out a tired breath. It’s been a good day. Good sales. We actually needed all three of us here today. I couldn’t be more grateful. But I’ve been here since two in the morning, and I’ve hit a wall. The wall of exhaustion.
My glass shop door swings open, and a man in a suit walks inside just as I slip a bonus orange roll into the box of four pecan sticky buns. I hand my current customer his box. “Thanks for coming to Sweet Swirls,” I say, praying he’ll be back and that Cricket didn’t scare him too much.
I muster a tired smile for the man who’s just walked in and tap the toes of my red tennis shoe together. “Can I help you?”
“I’m here to see Miss Leah Bradford.”
My brows pinch. Well, this isn’t normal. Most customers don’t ask for me by name. Maybe Cricket’s been offending customers all week and now they’re coming in to talk about it. “I’m Leah Bradford.”
Andrea walks through the push door that leads to the back kitchen. “Hey, your invite to Paula Franks’s wedding arrived. You know you have to go, right?”
I say nothing—Andrea’s going to talk for the both of us.
“She’s a huge client, Leah. You’re going. Oh, and Cricket is naming the rolls,” she says, planting herself next to me, not even noticing our customer. “So far, we have Galene, Abilene, and Silvia. I think she plans to take them home as pets. Where did you find her again?”
I clear my throat and Andrea’s eyes rove over to our customer waiting to speak to me.
“Miss Bradford,” the man says. “I’m here with a summons and a complaint.”
“A what and a what?” I say, looking to Andrea to see if she understands his gibberish.
“You’re being sued, Miss Bradford,” he says, holding out two manila envelopes. Two things I have no intention of taking .
“No, I’m not.” My hands have turned to thirty-pound weights. They hang at my side. There’s no way I can take those envelopes.
“You are. And I need to see you take the forms. Officially.”
“Officially?” I have never hated a word so much in my life.
Arnold peeks around the man, watching to see what I’ve done. Come on, Arnold. If you were a real friend, you’d tackle this guy from behind.
“Officially,” the man repeats. He’s a parrot in a suit, ready to suck all the joy out of my pretty shop.
“I’m not taking anything,” I say. “Why would anyone want to sue me? I have nothing. I’ve done nothing. I?—”
“Miss, please.” The man’s dumb hands never waver. They just hold those menacing envelopes out toward me.
I look at Andrea, hoping for an answer.
“I think you need to take them,” she whispers next to me.
I do not care for that answer.
I say nothing. I am a vault with weights for limbs. This isn’t happening.
“Ma’am?” he says. Wait, what happened to Miss?
“Fine,” Andrea grunts. “I’ll take them.” She reaches out a hand, and the man finally moves his unrelenting arms.
He jerks backward. “I can only give them to Miss Bradford. No one else.”
Arnold stands to the side now. Maybe my sample-stealing neighbor really will tackle this suited stranger, tell him to buzz off, and that Hammond St. isn’t the kind of neighborhood to sue or be sued. We don’t accept that kind of behavior. But Arnold doesn’t rescue me. No, the sample-stealing traitor just stares, his eyes darting from me to the suit.
“Let’s do it together,” Andrea suggests. And in my peripheral vision, I see Arnold nod at her suggestion. “Ready?” Standing behind me, my bestie takes me by the elbow, bends my lead arm, and forces my hand out toward my new number-one enemy.
But I ball my fingers into a fist and shake my head. “Uh-uh,” I mutter.
“One more try,” Andrea says as if I were a child in her Accepting Summons for Dummies class. She lobs my hand forward once more, and my fist punches into the edge of the offensive envelopes.
What did I ever do to those envelopes? To this man? Nothing—that’s what!
The man huffs out an irritated breath. “I can’t leave until you take the forms, Miss Bradford. This is a legal issue. You will be held in contempt of court, and Mr. Booker will win the case by default.” The man’s poopy-brown eyes widen. “Take. The. Forms.”
“Wait. PJ Booker?” Andrea says, saying the name of my ex-boyfriend out loud. We don’t do that. We call him Puke or Pathetic or Pompous. Never PJ.
I tug myself out of Andrea’s hold. “PJ is suing me? PJ ? As in, he broke up with me because the spineless jerk couldn’t handle that I was having more success at Bites and Bubbles PJ?”
“Uhh, I don’t know the logistics. I just saw his name.”
I snatch those manila envelopes from the suit’s hand. As if they were PJ himself, I squeeze, wishing that somehow I’ll simultaneously squeeze the guts out of my ex.
“Can I get one of those pecan sticky buns?” the man says.
The nerve. He serves me with a summons and a complaint, and now he wants a roll?
“Yes,” I say, grinding my teeth. “You can. Because I need the business.” I hold out my hand. “$5.89, tip not included.”
Andrea boxes up one roll, and the man leaves me with a ten-dollar bill .
“Are you going to open that out here?” Arnold asks, tipping his chin to the envelopes in my hands.
“No,” Andrea and I bark at the same time.
“Cricket!” I untie the apron from around my back, and in two clumsy tries, I manage to loop it off my head.
I smack my apron into Cricket’s hands the minute she walks through the kitchen doors. She’s already wearing one, but I need less clothes on my back right now. I need to breathe. “Sell anyone whatever they want! No naming the rolls! And no complaining.”
“You know Silvia would never talk to the other rolls like that.”
Cricket’s words are merely a flea on the grizzly bear now ruining my day. I push through the kitchen doors and lay both envelopes on the metal counter in the back, Andrea right on my heels.
I blow a shaky breath from my lips, my hands trembling as I rest them on the counter.
“Pencil-Pushing Joker is suing you? For what? You should be suing him for the two years of your life you can’t get back!”
I shake my head. I can’t even muster out a chuckle at Andrea’s excellent name-calling. “I—I have no idea.” My mind is blank. What could PJ want from me?
I open the first envelope and read:
“TO LEAH brADFORD,
You are hereby notified that Preston Jasper Booker has commenced an action against you.”
“An action?” Andrea says. “What kind of action?”
But I don’t know. That’s all it says.
I have no words. PJ is suing me. I slip my finger beneath the lip of the second envelope, unsealing the thing, when Cricket pokes her head into the kitchen.
“Hey, Leah, a customer is asking for you.”
I blink twice. A customer. Well, that’s easier than a chauvinistic ex suing you. Yes, please, let’s do that instead. “Of course,” I say, brushing my hands over my striped T-shirt.
“Leah!” Andrea moans, a hand slapping the envelope I’ve left behind.
“It’s a customer,” I say—as if I have no choice in the matter.
I exit the kitchen to see Arnold standing next to a very busy Cooper Bailey.
Ugh . Cooper . Really? As if my wound needed a little salt.
Only… Cooper is holding a fussy little boy who keeps smacking his cheek. A curly-haired toddler has wrapped herself around his right leg. And a young girl with long blonde hair and a worrisome expression on her face stands next to him.
“Uncle Coop, if we only get the pecan buns, all the other cinnamon rolls will feel sad. Silvia needs a good home.”
Cricket nods. “She gets it. Why don’t you?”
“I don’t want a raspberry roll or an orange roll or one of those sweet cream cinnamon rolls,” Arnold says, standing to Cooper’s right and scrunching his nose at the young girl with Cooper.
“But Cricket’s right,” the girl says. “The pecan rolls always get chosen. What about the raspberry rolls?”
“Then you get a raspberry roll. I want pecan.”
“Everyone can get whatever they want,” Cooper says as the little boy in his arms yanks on a handful of Cooper’s sandy-blond hair. “Hey, York. How about this?” He picks up my customer pen, the one Cricket washi-taped a big, pink, artificial Gerbera daisy to.
“Really?” I say, all the angst of menacing envelopes filling my insides. I snatch a plastic spoon from beneath the counter, walk around the glass case, and trade the baby.
“Seriously, Uncle Coop,” the little blonde says. “Do you want York to poke his eyes right out? Everyone knows you don’t give a baby a pen.”
“Not everyone,” Cooper says—and for the first time in his life, I think Cooper Bailey might be flustered.
Maybe I was wrong about salt in my wound. Maybe karma is offering me a pity point.
“I didn’t know. Besides, how is a spoon any better?” Cooper asks the girl.
The little boy, York, holds the spoon I gave him with both hands and gnaws on the serving end.
“It is,” I say, just as the little girl tells him, “It’s way better.”
“So, did you want a variety, or did you want to break all the other sweet rolls hearts today?” Cricket says.
“Cricket,” I gripe.
“I’m just making sure everyone has all the information.” She shrugs. “I don’t see the problem with that.”
“We will take the variety!” The girl holds one hand in the air, bouncing on the toe of one foot.
“Well, I want my pecan roll,” Arnold snaps.
“Okay,” I say, hands on hips. I can solve this problem, right? An obnoxious ex suing me for who knows what is a different story, but this—this is a problem I can solve. “Cooper, are you buying Arnold a roll today? Because we’re all done sampling. Right, Arnold?” I glare at the man and his combover waves back at me. He possibly picked the wrong day to ask me for another freebie.
Cooper puffs out his cheeks, defeated. “Yeah. I am.”
“Okay, Cricket, box up one pecan for Arnold.”
Cricket glowers at our neighbor.
“And half a dozen variety for the Baileys,” I say, without even asking how many rolls Cooper wanted. If he’s going to keep showing up in my shop, at times with unhappy children in tow, he’s going to pay for it.
I feel the tiniest bit better already.